Archive for the 'Website 2008-2009' Category

Last Friday, we climbed Table Rock! It was a lot of fun, and very tiring. 😀 We climbed with our reading buddies in Miss Link’s class, and Mr. Kuhlman’s, Mr. Lee’s and Mr. Elias’ classes.

View from the top of Lower Table Rock while we ate lunch.

Thanks so much to all of the parents who helped out on the trip. Thank you to Dylan’s mom, Katryna’s dad, Falon’s mom, Devin’s mom, and Kirsty’s parents. We appreciated you! Here are the pictures I was able to take before my camera died. Parents… if you have any other pictures could you email them to me, and I’ll post them?

This week, students wrote sentences in the present tense. The topics they chose were Michael Jordan and New Moon. They are going to post their own sentences under the comments section on this post. Enjoy!

Our school is participating in the Shape Up Across Oregon program. This is a statewide program that was developed to promote physical fitness and health in the youth of Oregon. This program runs fr0m April 1-30.

I am sending home materials, but basically, the kids enjoy their favorite physical activities to earn mileage on an imaginary journey across Oregon. Every 30 minutes of exercise earns them one segment on their journey. They can bike, run, skateboard, swim, play their favorite sport, walk the dog, etc. With every 30 minutes of activity, they get to fill in a box on the map I am sending home. We want them to be active everyday, so they can’t fill in more than 3 boxes a day. When the kids fill in their map, they need to bring them back to school. Every child who completes the journey across Oregon will get a certificate of completion signed by the Governor. They will also be eligible to win shape up prizes.

If the kids finish one map before the month is up, they should continue to keep track of their activity. We are talking about having a competition between the 4/5 classes, so every minute helps. 🙂

If you have any questions, leave a comment on here, and I will answer them as best as I can.

Ok, I’m just trying to keep you all up to date with what I know. 🙂 Next week, we are cutting Thursday and Friday, which would have been conference days. That means we are going to make Wednesday an all day conference day. There is no way to fit 30 scheduled, traditional conferences in. We are looking at an open house type situation. On Thursday, March 12, we are having a staff meeting to discuss how this is going to look. We will be sending home a letter on Friday to (hopefully) explain it as best we can. I am planning on sending home report cards and performance folders on Tuesday. The kids have been trained in leading their own conferences, and I will go over the items that I am sending home with them. They should be able to explain it to you. Then on Wednesday, I will be very happy to see any or all of you. I just can’t schedule you guys, and I can’t guarantee how much time I will be able to talk with you. It all depends on how many people show up, what their concerns are, etc. So…. long rambling to say…. I will send home a letter on Friday with more info. 🙂

This last week, the kids worked on writing past tense sentences. They are going to write those sentences on this post themselves, under the comments section. Enjoy!

Hmmm… it appears that some of the kids posted their comments to different sections. You may have to dig if you are looking for a particular sentence. Next time… be sure to pay attention to where you are posting! 🙂

As you probably already know from the paper and the news, schools are facing budget cuts this year thanks to the economy. Our district has been very careful not to panic and send out messages about cutting days when we didn’t know for sure what was going to happen with the budget. We wanted to wait and see what the state would come up with for the budget.

The news is in and it has become clear that we are going to have to cut quite a bit out of our budget for this year. Since most of our budget is made up with personnel costs, we had two choices- cut days or cut jobs.

We have come up with a tentative compromise with the administration. Right now we are trying to determine actual days cut. The administrators have agreed to cut eight days from their salaries, and then teachers and support staff are cutting five. We have worked really hard to find a way to minimize the impact on kids and families.

These cuts have to be approved by the union and then by the Southern Oregon Bargaining Council, but it is pretty much assumed that they will go through. Right now the days that we are discussing are March 19th and 20th, and then we are negotiating the other days. We chose the 19th and 20th because those are conferences-kids were already not going to be in class, so they will not be impacted by those days.

Wednesday the 18th was to be a half day. It now looks like that will change to a full conference day. Again, this is all just what we are talking about right now. I’m trying to keep you as informed and up to date as I am. If this changes, I will update you again. So, if we have one full day for conferences, there is no way to fit in 30 conferences. We are going to have to do more of an open house approach. I will send home a letter letting you know what times I will be at school, and you are welcome to come in and talk to me, or not.

Again, I’m sorry for all the craziness. I’ll keep you informed of any changes as soon as I know them.
🙂
Miss McNeil